By Our Correspondent
DUBAI/BHUBANESWAR: Dubai based Odia father-daughter scuba diving duo Priyadarshee Panigrahi and 13 year old Tisya Panigrahi, who hail from Sambalpur, have sent out a unique appeal to the COP 28 conference being held in Dubai, that too on United Arab Emirate’s (UAE) National Day (celebrated on the 2nd of December).
COP 28 is the United Nations (UN) Climate Change Conference. COP 28 stands for the 28th meeting of the Conference of Parties (COP) to the UNFCCC (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change). It is being held in Dubai from the 30th of November till the 12th of December.
This conference is where the world comes together to agree on ways to address the climate change crisis, such as limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, helping vulnerable communities to adapt to the effects of climate change, and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. Almost all the countries of the world are participating in the COP 28 conference.
Priyadarshee and Tisya are certified advanced scuba divers. While Priyadarshee is the head of the MENA (Middle East & North Africa) business of a large Indian multinational corporation (specializing in fast moving consumer goods), Tisya is a grade 8 student of Raffles World Academy, Dubai. Both of them are highly passionate about Scuba diving.
This father daughter advanced Scuba diver duo dived around 70 feet deep in Maldives on the 2nd of December (UAE’s National Day) in the pristine coral reefs near the Sun Siyam Olhuveli resort in South Male Atoll.
Ater reaching around 70 feet depth, in crystal clear waters and surrounded by colorful corals and prolific marine life they gave out their appeal by holding placards which carried the logo of COP 28 UAE and the simple yet powerful message of ‘PLEASE UNITE.ACT.DELIVER’. Unite.Act.Deliver happens to be the theme of the COP 28 conference and PLEASE was added to this to convey the urgency with which nations need to take action now.
Priyadarshee & Tisya feel very strongly about the need to urgently act on climate change and wanted to draw the attention of the World to this imminent threat which is causing havoc on Planet Earth.
They chose Maldives because, this tiny country of about 1190 coral islands, in the middle of the Indian Ocean, is the lowest lying nation in the world and therefore, sea level rise caused by global climate change is a grave existential threat. At the current rate of global warming, almost 80% of the Maldives could become uninhabitable by 2050, according to multiple reports from NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey.
Tisya said global warming leads to a warming ocean which causes thermal stress that contributes to coral bleaching. The colorful underwater coral reefs become white in color due to bleaching. She said diving in the Maldives particularly around the reefs off Sun Siyam Olhuveli resort has been magical for her as she got to see large marine life like Grey Reef Sharks, Black Tip Reef Sharks, White Tip Reef Sharks, Reef Manta Rays, Eagle Rays, Turtles etc. while enjoying thrilling drift dives fueled by ocean currents.
According to Priyadarshee, they wanted to draw the attention of the conference attendees and remind them once again that they have to act fast else it will be too late for any kind of intervention. He added ‘because the conference is being held in UAE, it was apt that we do this dive on the 2nd of December, UAE’s National Day’.
Maldivian national Hassan Yaaniu who is a diving instructor with Sun Siyam Resort Olhuveli’s diving school accompanied the father-daughter duo as their diving instructor and helped with the pictures. Yaaniu said he was impressed with Tisya’s comfort levels under water and also with the duo’s motivation to educate the world about climate change.
Tisya became Odisha’s youngest scuba diver in 2020 (at the age of 10) and also became the state’s youngest junior advanced scuba diver in 2022 when she dived 70 feet in Fujairah, UAE on her 12th Birthday to complete her certification from PADI. The father daughter diving duo have been in the news for various reasons like sending out Nuakhai wishes from under the sea in Aug’21 and diving with sharks in December last year. Earlier in April’23, inspired by Tisya, Priyadarshee dived 100 feet in Malaysia to secure his advanced scuba diving license, joining a very exclusive club of advanced scuba diving Father-Daughter duos.
Both of them got their certifications from PADI. California, USA headquartered PADI (Professional Association of Diving Instructors) is the world’s largest ocean exploration and diver organization, operating in 186 countries and territories, with a global network of more than 6,600 dive centers and resorts.
Tisya happens to be the granddaughter of former Minister and Member of Parliament from Odisha, Late Sriballav Panigrahi & educationist Late Smt. Sunanda Panigrahi. She also happens to be the granddaughter of former MLA of Sambalpur, Dr. Raeswari Panigrahi.
